Hajime Kinoko

Hajime Kinoko is a contemporary Japanese shibari and kinbaku artist whose work has been instrumental in propelling the practice into mainstream consciousness over the last two decades.

Hajime Kinoko (he/him) is known for his live shibari performances, music video work, art installations, collaborations with the likes of American rapper Brooke Candy and iconic fashion photographer Mario Testino. He is also known for tying everything from people, to flowers, to buildings. However, when he took up rope for the first time in 2000, it was for one simple reason: to impress a girl.

While the relationship may not have endured, Kinoko’s fascination with rope bondage did. Around 2003, the late rope master Akechi Denki held a workshop at the fetish bar where Kinoko worked, and it opened his eyes to the real meaning of tying people. In 2006, he began performing and creating art under the name “Hajime Kinoko”, founding his own rope school Ichinawa-kai at the same time.

In 2008, Kinoko began taking lessons from Nawashi Kanna (aka Kanna Akechi), who was a student of Akechi Denki. Kanna would go on to become a highly respected instructor in the shibari world in their own right. It’s from Kanna that Kinoko learned to tie intricately and beautifully. Today, many of the techniques Kinoko teaches are based on Kanna’s method – even the gote that Kinoko now teaches is an ode to Kanna’s influence, based on their tying and slightly customized.

Later, Kinoko met renowned nawashi and rope bondage video producer Haruki Yukimura, and took lessons from him for several years. From Yukimura, Kinoko learned how to interact with models and how to show a model’s body in an aesthetically pleasing way, among other techniques.

Over the last 20 years, Kinoko has become a deeply influential shibari instructor and artist by reimagining shibari outside of its traditional applications and even outside of its traditional aesthetic. From intricately bound rocks and trees to neon ropes, cyber shibari performances in nightclubs, shibari-inspired fashion editorials, and large-scale rope art installations on the Burning Man Playa — Kinoko's work spans an extraordinary range of creative expression.

His largest-scale works include tying entire buildings in elaborate rope designs. Among his most celebrated projects is the StandBy Gallery in Harajuku, which he famously transformed in 2022 by covering the structure in an intricate web of bright red ropes. The installation also featured a live performance in which several clothed models were tied to the building, merging performance art with architectural rope installation.

When it comes to Kinoko’s own sources of inspiration, it’s not to the world of contemporary art, BDSM or kink that he looks, but to Japan’s artistic legacy and culture. He cites ikebana (flower arranging), calligraphy, and the shamisen (a three-stringed traditional Japanese musical instrument) as some of the things influencing his approach to shibari right now. And even though shibari may traditionally have its roots in more lowbrow culture, you’re as likely to encounter Kinoko’s work in various art galleries, at the Annual Tokyo Art Fair or even find him lecturing on modern rope bondage at universities as you are to find him, well, right here on Shibari Study.